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I am trying to finalize our travel within China for our March trip. I have decided that we would prefer to take the train rather than fly between many locales. For our Beijing-Xi'an journey, I know that we have two options....high speed or overnight. Which makes more sense? Is there any benefit to doing one or the other?

In terms of purchasing tickets, I see that my options are to wait til we get there and hope that the tickets we want are available. Alternatively, we can pay a small premium and have an outside company buy them for us recognizing that there is still no guarantee that the tickets will be available.

If we decide to take the overnight train, I think I would like to contract with an agent to get the tickets for us. Which group do you all recommend?

I like the overnight Z trains between Beijing and Xi'an for myself, but overnight train travel is not for everybody. My suggested list of people who should forego overnight trains and either book daytime high-speed rail or fly....or alter itinerary to include intermediate stopovers:

--Those who cannot endure a certain lack of privacy and particularly if traveling with less than four people, since there's a high possibility you'll be sharing a compartment with others. If one ends up in open-rack hard sleeper rather than closeable-door soft sleeper, there will be even less privacy.

--Those who have a history of not sleeping well on trains or other public transport, unless you are prepared to spend the next day fighting fatigue while sightseeing (I am in this category but take overnight trains anyway).

--Those who are over 182 cm (6 feet) tall due to compartment length. Now there are plenty of people this tall who are OK with fitting themselves into a berth, but tall folks who require a full stretch-out may not be able to find a comfortable position.

--Those who have medical issues that require high-frequency toilet visits. Also those who are particularly squeamish about toilet sanitation and/or in-floor toilets. Note that high-speed trains (including the D's which run overnight on some routes) have larger and better quality toilets that usually are kept in better shape.

--Those who get motion sickness from standard trains. (High speed trains in China usually have a very smooth motion that doesn't produce the typical train-rocking effect.)

There are definitely routes that have poorer quality trains than others, so laying out your planned itinerary might give you some more specific recommendations.

There are very few routes in China that offer the 2-person "deluxe soft sleeper" compartments and there aren't very many on a train that does have them. Point being, they are an option for a subset of travelers but their availability is the exception not the rule. And they can be as expensive as flying. I want to add one more general partial caveat:

--Those who cannot climb need to be careful to obtain a lower berth. Lower berth sleepers are usually are the first to sell out, so if this is a requirement for overnight train travel, one needs to err on the side of caution and book earlier rather than later in the advance sales period.

We took the overnight train from Beijing to Xian in November2013. We booked our tickets through china-diy-travel. Their service was excellent!!! Because we were 2 parties of 3 each, we chose to book out an entire berth for each party of 3, paying for the empty berth to ensure that we were all comfortable and to have our privacy. This worked out very well since we used the bottom sleeper to put all our luggage onto. We all managed to get some sleep!

#8 did you use an extra passport or ID to book the extra berth? Because ticket sales are now one ID/passport required for every berth purchased. If you were allowed to book 4 berths using only 3 ID's, then some shenanigans went on somewhere, and that gambit may or may not be replicatable by other travelers.